Month: September 2016

The transitions…

~ ddgaikwad ~ Leave a comment

There have been times when I was completely unaware of certain things in my own way and life… There was a time when everyone used to call me with my name or a nick name or something that would really make you uncomfortable in a group of people…

Then the years go by, and you move from School to College, you are a junior, then another year passes by and you are a sophomore now…
In those years of college, you call whoever you want, with whatever name you wish, there are no barriers, there are just these friendly gestures, and best of all no one gets offended… Because you know that something similar will be thrown back at you!

Finally, you graduate and move to the “real world”, you start looking for job… you start addressing people with proper salutations, you know because you need to look good and you really need that job…

You get the job, you start working with a team, they are all of your age, passed out in the same year…
Again you have that same college kinda environment, you feel liberated, you work with same enthusiasm, you make progress…

You start moving upwards in chain of command (I mean the corporate ladder…)

One day you move out and head to another Organization, now you have your team, you work with them, you do your best.
You create healthy and friendly environment where people are with you because, there are no barriers of seniority or age or industry experience, everyone is content and learn form one another…

Then one day, the team you loved is spread across, its no more there… you go to work with heavy heart and a lot of thoughts.. you see another set of team, you try to create the same rapport, But…..
To your shock you are made to realise, that you are senior, in age, position and industry experience and should behave like one! All these words come out of the mouth of a kid, who has been recently hired…

Suddenly you see all these barriers! Then you realise small things that have changed in the due course of time…
The gatekeeper calling your sir… The new kid addressing with respect… The cab driver, even though elder than you, addressing with salutations…

Next day you just wake up with a heavy heart and get ready and head back to work, thinking what went wrong in all these years… Get to office and start working, keeping those barriers up and observing all those newly joined grads and remembering your own good old days….

The Experience…

~ ddgaikwad ~ Leave a comment

It always makes me wonder, how when one shares something, could it be, person, thing, emotion or an event for that matter. Something that makes you feel special.
Its funny, how it makes you vulnerable? How it exposes you to someone, who might take advantage of it? How it turns out to be a sore experience altogether, all because someone used that small piece of information just to put you down!

It brings us to the second point, then with this bitter experience we come to an understanding. Why, people wear masks, and these masks are different for different people…
Its one for the work, one for the family and one for someone who is special to them…

You get to know the importance of wearing masks, it makes you wonder why you don’t have to be the same you for everyone else.
Why you need to be reserved for all the others out there, and how you need be you, with the ones who understand you…

These small bitter experiences, thus elevate the importance of wearing masks and finding happiness, just for oneself, by being a tiny bit more selfish… and nothing else…

Knock knock…

~ Pied Piper ~ Leave a comment

Is it just me ? or does everyone stand in front of the glass doors , hoping that it will open automatically?

I visited a client recently and he had a set of doors placed consecutively in a passageway.

Both of them were made of glass obviously. When I approached the innermost door, it opened automatically, so then I proceeded to the next one.

Imagine my surprise when the door did not open. It took me a whole of 2 minutes to realize that I had to push the door.The embarrassment was compounded by the fact that a cute lady was looking at me, bemused by my predicament.

All I could do was to give her a sheepish grin, pull the door a few times and then push it, even though the words”PUSH” were written in capital and bold letters.

Technology makes us lazy and ignorant.

Mall Visits…Part 2

~ Pied Piper ~ Leave a comment

Earlier in the month, I had published a write-up on the people we see in the mall.To read that article, click here : Mall visits… Part 1

These are the people who inspire us to go to the mall. These are the people who spark my quest to observe human behaviour from various countries around the world.

Before we proceed to the anecdote, I want to make it clear that some Canadian Popstar singing”let’s go to the mall….. tonight”, does not really appeal to me. Only the fact that “Robin” is supper awesome, made me watch that song. Anyway…

The unsatisfied wife: 

We were still in the queue for a pizza, when a man of about 30 years of age came and established himself in front of the queue. A group of teenagers was already waiting there, browsing the menu and discussing what to order.I would like to point out, that unlike some other groups, these boys were exceptionally well behaved and were not causing much of a ruckus that is typical of a group of teenagers.

So this guy, ignores the queue and stands next to one of the boys. He makes a hand-motion where he formed a cone by bringing together all his fingers and pointing then upwards. The typical motion I associate with an Italian and an Arab, to get a point across.  He said something which I  think meant that he needed the boy to move away a bit.

The boy obliged.

Then this guy turns back to a woman and pointing to the empty space on the ground  suggested that she should stand here to give an order. I imagined she was his wife.

The wife obliged.

She glanced briefly up to the menu displayed on the top display. 10 seconds later she nodded her head in disapproval. There was a look of intense fury on the guy’s face, but he did not say a word.

The moved on to the next eatery.

This activity continued for a further 20 mins, by which time, they had managed to cover Pizza hut, McDonalds, Subway, KFC, Red Dragon, Nandos and a few other places, covering almost every cuisine usually offered in a mall.

By this time, I had ordered the pizza and the pizza was ready to eat, so could not follow their progress, but it was evident :

It is indeed difficult to understand what women want.

Mall visits… Part 1

~ Pied Piper ~ 1 Comment

Visiting a mall is extremely entertaining. There are thousands of people around, which means there are a thousand different opportunities to observe human behavior and quirks.

In one such visit recently, I came across once such incident. Now, I am not very good at any language other than English and my native, but actions speak louder than words. So all this is my take on the events.

The testy Father:

There was a big family, 5 kids, their Dad and their mothers- who had come for shopping and were now hungry.

The dad was ordering a pizza for the entire family. He stood in the queue, waiting for his turn. His son, looked about 10 year old, came and stood next to him. He check if his father was paying attention to him. He was safe. His father was busy selecting which pizza would be best. He looked around. There was a hugh pile of pizza delivery  boxes, neatly staked, on the counter. He pushed them. the tower of boxes did not come down, but the deed was noticed by the Dad. He got irritated and asked the kid to stop doing that. Dad went back to contemplating how he can feed his litter. The moment the dad looked away, the child, with a sheepish smile, touched the boxes again twice, just to show his defiance. Dad noticed that and now ordered him to go sit with the rest of the family. The kid, touched the pile, one last time and ran to him mother.

Now, by the time this happened, Dad has reached the front of the queue and placing an order. The sales assistant was trying to communicate in gestures and English (which is not native here), that it was Tuesday and he gets a free pizza with every pizza he orders, but dad was having a hard time to understand that. In all this commotion, his other son, who looked 15 year old, came and asked him for some money to eat the pancakes from the next stall.

The Dad give him a look that would have melted the Himalayas faster than the global warming. The Boy was unperturbed. The dad, shaking his head, put his had into his pocket and game him a tenner. By now he looked very irritated. He must be thinking:

Here I am, trying to buy these guys a pizza, where this red Tshirt guy is trying to tell be that I can order less because he is happy to give a free pizza, God knows why. My son is asking money to by pancakes when he is going to have pizza in a few minutes. He will say that he doesn’t want a pizza now because he is not hungry now. And to think only yesterday he demanded that he wanted to eat Pizza tomorrow, no matter what. My other kid is trying to cause me embarrassment by causing havoc when he manages to topple the tower of boxes, the baby keeps crying and the two girls keep roaming around like they own the place.  God help me !